Dr. Oblivion responds to a few blog posts and comments in the live chat and Twitter feed and takes the time to talk about WordPress and getting started with themes and plugins.

See the assignment for experimenting with plugins and themes in your blog at the end of this post here.

Notes from the discussion

The Import of twitter ? why it is crucial to be following along with twitter for #ds106

A couple of points about the DailyShoot

• Make images public and creative commons on flickr.
• You should be tweeting the image with the syntax I sent to you in an email.

Dissonance
From Tim Owens in yesterday’s live chat session:

Is there some dissonance between telling everyone to get their own webhost and in the same breath telling them to put their images of Flickr and get a twitter account?

Physical versus Virtual: the world we find ourselves in

The privileging of the physical classroom for far too long, the necessary move to the virtual because that is the space in which the world’s agenda is formed and executed. It is in the ether that power is being defined and wars are fought. It is a question of the battle for information, who controls, who shapes it, and who can decipher its various meanings. A majority of the world’s classes should be virtual because a vast majority of the world’s information has already been vrtualized. We limp twoards the 21st scentury like wounded animls, nay screaming children afriadof the undeniable present that is has continued to be cast as our future.

Michael Branson Smith “DS106 as RPG, part 1″

What’s becoming unique about DS106 is that every day it becomes less of a course and more of a community. And this community behaves in a way that I want to liken to a role playing game (RPG).

Doctor Oblivion “The Real Ruler of this Class”

The connections are ethereal, as the architecture of the spiders is sound in connection and node, the connection between our lives will deepen and strengthen over the days and nights to come and we will build a small village of ties, bound with rope together we will wander in the star streaked night and visit strange lands. In these strange lands, filled as they may be with buttons and clicks and terms unknown, we will know frustration and anger. Together, tied as we are, we will ride into the night screaming.

______

Tomorrow you shall receive the second warning. The second message. The second revelation. And you shall be closer to the purpose. Closer to the light. Closer to Oblivion.

Joe Fehrman’s “Introduction to ds106 Dr. Oblivion”

After reviewing the video introducing my ds106 course I have come to the realization that most of the technologies that are covered in ds106 are essentially media based. However there is nothing leading edge about having a facebook, twitter, flickr, or youtube account. It almost seems as though this should be more of a literature class instead of a cs106 course like at UMW. I don’t believe that it takes a CS major to figure out how to create a web domain or create accounts with these services.

Alan Liddell point out in this post that “technology is driving human evolution”
http://www.liddellsystems.com/blog/?p=32

Assignment: Experimenting with your blog’s plugins and themes

Note: If you are not hosting your own domain/blog for this course don’t sweat this part of the assignment and just skip down to part b of assignment 2 below.

First, I would like each of you to start experimenting with your blog space. Look for information and tutorials online about how to embed videos, include images, audio files, etc. (All things you will need to know shortly.) What’s more, do some research on the features of WordPress, there are literally thousands of free themes (template designs) and plugins (third party extension to give you more capabilities) that you can experiment with. Below I will list a few plugins I strongly encourage you to in install.

• Subscribe to Comments: Allows commentators to subscribe to a comment thread, this is crucial for this class, and easy as pie to install. Just go to Plugins–>Add and search for Subscribe to Comments. Once you have uploaded it, activate it and you are ready to go.

• Twitter Tools: I would like you all to play with Twitter Tools. Ever since Twitter move to a new OAuth this plugin has become a pain to install, but give it a shot, and their is extensive documentation in the plugin panel itself, be sure to read it.

• Akismet (already installed): this will prevent your blog from being over run by evil spammers. NB: you will need an Akismet API key—would love if someone posted the play-by-play for others, or even found one.

• Google Analytics: Experiment with some Google Analytics plugins for WordPress—go to add plugin and search for “google analytics”—you should find a bunch. I’ll be expecting that you sign-up for a Google account and get Analytics running on your blog. Google Anlyticator is one of many.

• Install a Flickr plugin that will display your dailyshoot Flickr images on a post or page of your blog.

Other: look for other stuff you might be interested in. It could be anything from plugins for Facebook, Flickr, YouTube, plugins, etc. Contact form plugins, etc. Get creative.

When you are done, report back on your process, what you’ve discovered, what you installed, and any issues you may be having. Remember, if you have issues—use your blog or Twitter to communicate you process and your problems—it is expected.

Tag this assignment: blogexperiment